A passive optical network (PON) is a point-to-multipoint optical network, where an optical line terminal (OLT) at the central office (CO) is connected to multiple optical network units (ONUs) at remote nodes through one or multiple arrayed waveguide gratings (AWGs). The ONUs can be, for example, associated with network subscribers and can include one or more customer premise equipment (CPE). The connection between the OLT and the ONU is usually passive (i.e. without any power supply).
A PON can employ wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) to form a WDM-PON. FIG. 1 shows a schematic of a WDM-PON 100, which includes a CO 110 and multiple CPEs 120(1) to 120(6) (collectively referred to as CPEs 120). The CO 110 includes a small form factor pluggable (SFP) transceiver 112 to emit optical signals at different wavelengths and an arrayed waveguide grating (AWG) 114 to multiplex these optical signals into a single optical line 115 (e.g., a fiber). An optional amplifier 116 can be used to amplify the multiplexed signal. At the other end of the optical line 115 is a second AWG 130, which directs different optical signals to different CPEs 120(1) to 120(6). Each optical connection between a CPE 120(i) and the CO 110 is at a distinct wavelength, where i=1, 2 . . . 6.
One challenge in a WDM-PON is channel provisioning. Typically the wavelength used by the remote end is provisioned at either end in a consistent manner. Cases exist, however, where the remote ends are not easily accessible for provisioning. For example, in access networks, the remote ends include CPEs (e.g., CPEs 120) located in the customers' premises and become the Internet access once properly installed. Before installation, access to the Internet to provision the CPE is not guaranteed. In addition, the dynamic circuit network (DCN) used to configure the CPE may be down or overloaded, so the CPE cannot be reached. In some cases, on-site maintenance personnel may not be sufficiently skilled to provision the CPE correctly.